Finding Freedom

Forcing a tight grasp on my one life 

fearing it’s mournful evaporation

the spin takes hold lifting my mind

into clouds of distraction.

I rebuff my knowing

thrilled at the chance for a momentary reprieve

from my inner child’s clawing for help

I think she’ll beg forever

until the pleading stops 

Oh she’s just pouting

But she has gone hunting

gone to find herself a hero

seeking liberation from her pains of rejection 

from the burden of her self imposed isolation

this 14 yr old ache of self loathing

So the wheel spins

and the goal is a delicious terrifying mystery

A journey pushed on me like unpredictable trade winds 

driven to discover a new world of attentions & promised affection

her relentless longings for a mirror of recognition

flings me into sacred shadows of fear and sadness

buries me alive in tombs of shame and hopelessness 

 resurrects me with grief and anger

shakes me at my depths

Still, I don’t see her

 just an insatiable wrath for love

insane strategies and strangely distorted musings

swirling around in a directionless dense abyss.

Early termination has become optionless.

An invisible compass points true north 

while a quiet hum vibrates searching for it’s counter point

searching for home 

A deeper beacon locks in on it’s target

the hum rises into my mind, thoughts level, breath expands

I feel the support of where I sit

yielding to a sound beneath the higher frequencies

of survival and hunger

after 5 decades she surrenders.

many breaths brought me here to sway my mind

finding love always present, always listening

In me, I am home.

I look with my eyes open

You sit within me, watching,

waiting patiently to catch my awareness

Between my scanning and focusing until I rest 

in your gaze

 seen.

This Source from where all things flow 

where all things return

exchanged for my confusion,

a lifetime reprieve

I am paused at this mirror

drinking in from an endless well of loving witness.

So the light is called forth

 Seen & shines

Revealing a comfort contained within

Belonging!

Bringing relief from the tight grasp I force on life

Welcoming!

 Evaporating effort gladly.

In this womb I consent to 

Receive

Receive

 Receive.

What is Suffering?

Attached to blame I am justified
With resentment I am protected, Anger, it defines me!
Let go?  I will be lost.
No sense of who I am, where I am, what I am.
I resist this new offering of surrender, to disappear.

So, sorrow's flood reassures me, I know how to feel love!
I stay gripped, hanging on, it defines my depth of being.
Fearing the loss of grief, worry & my claims of caring so very much
I resist the shallowness and weakness of letting go.
I am real, I am here, I am alive!

Holding my breath I hold myself, so tight against this storm
What can I love that is bigger than my cry?
Pain rigid inside, terror screaming silent, no voice, no sight, no hope.
A threshold of panic crossed with a push from overwhelm.
Oh! my pain and panic see me and reach out for balance.

In a breath it is, in an instant a gift.
Exchanging my furies for a flower?
Washed in a sacred hum from above and below
I see, I hear, I feel
I have not perished
I'm not alone!

When The Waves Overtake Me

Todays endless tears soaking my efforts to stay grounded and pleasant

Offering jousts of humor to distract the persistent eruptions.

A day's honest work completed with waves of deeper grief pounding my inner breakwater 

Will the smooth love on love stones hold against this relentless flash flooding of rage?

I need something!

What a perfect event to yield addictions' trance and float into her controled clutches

A surrendered cry outward wanting you to anchor me in hope or clarity.

The ping returned -  join the fierce wind animating our shore

be with her powerful wild gusts, enormous surging and erupting 

sharp sting of sand flying 60 ft from ground driven against its weight

erasing all marks of life daring to mar its surface.

I needed to be with something I love

something more powerful than

all these emotions crashing thru me

I didn't reach you

but I did reach the ocean's surge and wind's gale

My pain stood quiet in reverence.

My Sheltering Sky

Where does my skin end and the air begin?
In your presence I am led
With your gaze I am seen
I cautiously perch my soul on the edge of my tongue,
You have never given me a reason not to trust you.

 But for having exposed myself
 My history, my unloveliness
I was in fear of regret once leaving you last night.

Awake
In one breath to discover my teenager
present to receive from me.
 Hold her now!
Give her this part of myself
This listening and attention I have infused from you.
Awake
 I can be with my pain, her history, our thoughts
 I am not alone!
Awake
I can see myself, her need, our joining  
I wait, allowing for her.
Awake
 I can be with her stories, those impulses and urges.

She, close as breath & blood and bones
 We are not separate!

 Here is where the boundaries of
Skin and thoughts and time melt
 allowing this union.

Awake
I sit on this blustery ledge of earth now
watching a storm shape my late morning sky
delighting in all the subtlety, anticipation and fertility.
 

 Lunar Eclipse of the Winter Solstice

12 Voluptuous moons gush reflected sun
upon my night time rituals,
  Illuminating cloaked hours of celebration
An illusive dance surrenders to
Softer light, forsaking shame.
Drawn to emerse under dappled light of
Blending dark river to sea waters
Yield a current for birthing.

But what of this final engorged moon
Burning blood red?
Inverted reflection of earth’s dense body,
Her small being inhibits the
Source of my full night moon!

Held in space as a breath,
Waiting to be expressed with a
Sigh of relief.
Gratitude opening to another
Cycle beginning.

Unfolding

The place we explore in body and in dreams

Is a sun-drenched garden of wild flowers

Watered by the morning dew

Cooled by evening sunsets

New seeds are sown by winter winds

Into this open fertile soil

Thriving with roots entwined

And blossoms unfolding

Surrendering again to the summer light

Emersed in a the new season

Vast and vibrant with life

Our dance takes us within sunlit grasses

Of translucent green and iridescent gold

We walk these paths of our unfolding  

Sharing what makes our spirits’ soar

And comforting each others’ tears

Discovering our depths

Illuminating our shadows & embracing our passions

Into each other’s hearts we will reveal our secrets

While the seasons cycle past

As the maple’s red fire is cooled by winter’s silver rain

Giving birth to flamboyant wildflowers

Dancing with us again in summer breezes.

Understanding Passion

Wave Riders have a passion
 Driven past any resistance to dawn's break
Rising with alacrity into a promise
Contained in the water's swell.
 
Early twilight mornings
Often cold to the bone,
Peeling on slick black neoprene
Over bare naked skin
Exposed to a rush of damp sea air
Diving into icy waters to paddle through
Endless surges of swells to wait and wait and wait
For the core of their passion.
 
Entering into earth’s wetness
Connecting body & soul
Surges call to discover her womb
Held within the ocean’s revealing
She shares her power for a moment.
Unified within her rhythm depends on her
Depends on you
A flash of engaging energies.
 
I ride within the swells of our bodies blending
As if entering connection with an ocean’s wave
A passion I return to over and over and over
Passing through obstacles
 Which no others seem to brave
And I discover I’m within your most secret spaces

Our mutual surrender
 A surfer’s undying need to return to the ocean.

TWILIGHT

I watched the ocean absorb the sky tonight

In all her hues and vibrancy

They shared their essence with each other so willingly

Iridescent pink orange fire

shimmering hot textures

Among frosty sapphire lavender foam

The colors draw me in

None I know 

other than from the blending of these two forces

These beings sharing their emboldened passions

A spark that ignites every day for the past millions of years

And each time unique and magical

A blending across vast distances where neither is

Diminished in the communion

Where both are exhaulted in the display

I get to witness their surrender and become part of their dance

Your Touch

Sitting alone within an ocean sunset

I’m dreaming of your touch

It is sensual

Not like these crashing waves I see

More like

The spindrift that melts into the evening’s

Dance of sea and sand and sky

Your touch is

The ocean’s spray that leaps to kiss the air above

Your touch is

The sea mist lingering in space

Blending with warm breezes

Moistening the rolling dunes and sea grasses

Your touch is

Sunlight embracing these mountain silhouettes

Shimmering through the veil of fog that longs to

Rest among the treetops

Your touch is

The fog that nestles between the hills 

That pour themselves down to the shore

Your touch is

My longing

My desire for more than a dream

Together our flesh does not fear

Our souls’ embrace

My Memory

Waking to those fiery red tulips

Holding the morning light within their bellies

Reminds me of how

All the air catches fire between us

Melting warm soft skin

Losing ourselves in passion heated curves

& Moist hollows

 Gazing into a sun bursts of pines  

flooding our tangle of 

flesh and sheets and pillows

 I feel the warmth that radiates

From your eyes

While soaking in this new morning

The impression of your touch

Traces my earth's shape

Leaving a breath of memory like

The dampened sand from the

Ocean's kiss upon her shore

End This Longing

I am missing your passion tonight

You lay next to me yet

The room is void of your laughter

 fantasies and moans. 

I am missing your thick brown hair

Where my fingers seek to roam

 a soft smile, eyes of light 

behind long exotic lashes

I am missing the wrap of bodies

Our entering with tales of magic and song

Only to stoke embers burning in my breast

 Refreshing me with cooling words of water

You know what moves my soul

Art of passion, sparkling joy, relenquishing tenderness

Entered me with all your ways

In all the ways you imagine.

Sounding my thoughts, entwining my life, merging my body.

Come find me in your dreams

Have you lost your way home?

Our Crucible

Dreaming became our longing

Manifested in two souls desired

crucibled and birthed

Flesh shedding into new skin

Exposed to sun and rain and all elements

Feeling the ghost fear engulf me 

like a stiff wool sweater pulled over my head 

snap into release.

I still trust in mystery’s expectation

surrender to unknown familiarities

Merge into my passions’ longing

Stepping beyond the veil of my attachments & pretending

Awake, aware of your side

now closer

Resting from years of a secret birthing

In it there is peace

and our merging strikes fire

Where does my skin end and the air begin?

 Air with words now 

spiced and liquid.

 A new crucible begins.

Lunar Rhythms

The moon guided me home to your memory last night

Turning toward open seashore

smiling upon me

A smile from you

Thoughts emerge of our rhythms 

Centered in our spirits’ loins

A soft ebb and flow

Of lapping ocean soaking deep into sandy crystals

The same moon surges every ocean

and awakens my dance with you

Showing her face day and night

Coming to me like a late night lover finding her mate

Caressing the curve of my side

Kissing my eyelids open

To find me entwined in her glow

She lingers within our days

Glowing softly like your whispers

Reminding me of your delicate touch

Her body transforms from full and bold

Into the most delicate smile

Hovering in the twilight sky

Hers is a slow sensual rhythm

Inspiring dramatic ocean surges

Which retreat to

Disclose starry seashells glistening

On freshly dampened sand

The moon calls us to take her as our own

Shinning her light of passionate memories into our thoughts

Her rhythms pulse within our soul

And we find her embodied in our lovers’ embrace

Marine Biology

Alone in the aquamarine water of your body

I pour forth my prayer of love

The bliss of skin and breath exchanged under  

Waterfalls of deep seaweed caressing

Our bodies suspended between indigo liquid air

And a canopy of filtering fingers of sunlight

We are undulating bellies of translucent reds

And iridescent blues

I am 

Your jellyfish lover

Mango Morning

Body’s awakend before dawn

Longing to taste our memories

Wanting to satisfy cravings for 

Soft, sweet and juicy

I hoped the dawning would linger 

Along with your gentle touch on my breast

Yet a soft orange glow emerged into

An expectant day

I wish I could have rolled back

That morning to spend another

Night entwined with you

A night unexpected

 An answer

A reprieve

A night of bodies glowing hot

Cooled not from our sweat

Only from the momentary 

Refrain of touch

My craving for you still ached

Yet you coaxed me into the day 

With cool strawberries and mangos

Forsaken in our evenings passion for 

Something more enticing

Those mangos, a sweet compromise

Calming my fire but

Not extinguishing it

Fiery Red Tulips

Waking to fiery red tulips
Holding the morning light
 within their bellies,
Reminds me of how
all the air catches fire between us.

Lingering in this flood of morning light
We melt into warm fluid skin
Surrendering our consciousness in
passion heated curves
& moist hollows.
 
 Gazing toward a sun burst of pines  
flooding our tangle of
flesh and sheets and pillows
I release into the warmth that radiates
From your eyes.

The impression of your touch
Traces my earth's shape
Leaving a breath of memory like
The dampened sand from the
Ocean's kiss upon her shore.

When The Waves Overtake Me

Todays endless tears soaking my efforts to stay grounded and pleasant

Offering jousts of humor to distract the persistent eruptions.

A day's honest work completed with waves of deeper grief pounding my inner breakwater 

Will the smooth love on love stones hold against this relentless flash flooding of rage?

I need something!

What a perfect event to yield addictions' trance and float into her controled clutches

A surrendered cry outward wanting you to anchor me in hope or clarity.

The ping returned -  join the fierce wind animating our shore

be with her powerful wild gusts, enormous surging and erupting 

sharp sting of sand flying 60 ft from ground driven against its weight

erasing all marks of life daring to mar its surface.

I needed to be with something I love

something more powerful than

all these emotions crashing thru me

I didn't reach you

but I did reach the ocean's surge and wind's gale

My pain stood quiet in reverence.